Posted on 11/08/2004 6:55:26 AM PST by Oldeconomybuyer
A week before I left Odessa, Texas to begin my first year at Stanford, I was walking down my street when a sweet, elderly neighbor and family friend noticed me and gave me this parting, final piece of advice, “I know Stanford’s up around San Francisco, but remember your values and don’t become like one of them.” I know many of you might be surprised, but this is the way millions of Americans think. They are not bad people; the people in my hometown are actually as nice as they come. But they’ve been exposed to different things, and Republicans have molded their view of liberals as flag-burning, God-blaspheming, peace-flag-waving hippies.
That’s why red state Democrats need to speak up. Many of us campaigned and poured our hearts out into the last few months, and we now wake up feeling like hell.
So as a Southerner, this is what Democrats have to do to win back America.
1) Have joy. Sounds simple, but in other words, cheer up. Don’t walk around bitter that conservatives are running this country.
History is on our side. From race issues to feminism to gay rights, liberals have always stood on the forefront of social and moral advance. As Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “The arc of history is long, but it bends toward justice.”
2) Fight for every race. The next presidential election might be four years away, but we have our work cut out for us before then. Each race helps frame political attitudes nationwide and affects the whole landscape.
If the Democrats lose four more Senate seats in the 2006 elections, they’ll lose their ability to filibuster Bush’s judicial nominations, and we can all say good-bye to affirmative action, a woman’s right to choose and the separation between church and state.
3) Define God and “moral values.” Red-state voters want to be able to identify with candidates by knowing how religion calculate into their thinking. Liberals win on the issues, but we have serious PR problems. We just have to connect the Democratic agenda to notions of morality, family and God, as shameless as that might feel.
4) Get over yourself. I’ve been so annoyed by those who critique Tom Daschle, say Michael Moore’s a radical and try to sound smart by saying they’re fiscal conservatives. Republicans have something we need: party discipline. Ronald Reagan’s famous 11th amendment was, “Thou shalt not speak ill of any fellow Republican.” It’s time we quit criticizing our own in public.
5) Dumb it down and get dirty. That means running negative campaign ads that parallel the type of vicious demagoguery launched against patriots like Max Cleland, Bill Clinton and John Edwards.
The Kerry campaign missed its chance to tear at Bush’s character and honor, and instead ran Brady Bunch ads that had less resonance in voters’ minds. Run campaigns as much on character as on the issues.
6) Play offense. The Republicans took our legitimate disdain for Bush and convinced the American public that we were all just hateful people.
As a result, Kerry never made direct criticisms of the incumbent president during his nomination acceptance speech, and he never nipped the “flip-flopper” charges at the bud.
Democrats need to stand up early and passionately, as well as stake out issues before the Republicans beat them to it.
7) Be proud of being a liberal. I’ll never forget listening to an audience member at a Democratic National Convention event choking back tears and asking former Gore campaign manager Donna Brazile, “When did being liberal become so bad?”
Brazile explained how we lost the word years ago during the Great Society reforms, when conservatives appealed to voters’ most sinister hatreds toward the poor and minorities. Don’t run away from the liberal title like Kerry did; be unapologetic and flaunt it.
8) Become more hawkish. Harry Truman and John F. Kennedy were more hawkish than their opponents. Liberals will continue to lose if they look weak on defense and have members that keep sporting those silly “war is not the answer” bumper stickers.
“If you punch me, I’ll punch you harder.” That’s the saying posted in Terry McAuliffe’s office. And it applies to our generation more than anything. For America to progress, it needs us to fight, fight, and fight. As Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”
This is our generation’s cause. Let’s make sure it outlasts us.
Amit Patel is a senior majoring in international relations with a secondary major in history. E-mail him at ... [snip]
These clowns just can't let it go - thery're still holding onto the same tactics that got them beaten on 11/2! What was it that Napolean said: "Never interfere when your enemy is making a serious mistake"?
We should encourage this type of behavior on their part -- there are lots of vulnerable DemoRat Senators (and a few RINOs) coming up for re-election in 2006. Let them hang onto their anger for one more election cycle, we could make good use of a fillibuster-proof Senate majority!
If they want to shoot themselves in the foot, I'll gladly buy them the bullet.
Liberals win on the issues, but we have serious PR problems. We just have to connect the Democratic agenda to notions of morality, family and God, as shameless as that might feel.
How can they do that when everything they stand for is about destroying morality, family and religion is beyond me. I guess that means Lie like you mean it.
Liberals will continue to lose if they look weak on defense and have members that keep sporting those silly “war is not the answer” bumper stickers.
Wow, this advice is gonna fly all right... Like a toolbox! Even if they tried it, it wouldn't work. They could start today and come up with a couple of new 527s like "Liberals for Nuclear Superiority" or "Bitch-slap Terrorists Liberally" and it wouldn't convince anyone. It would be like a goat spouting Shakespeare because their history works against them big-time.
Credibility on national defense is a Conservative strong-point because Conservatives have been credible on national defense for longer than this dweeb has been on the planet.
Brazile explained how we lost the word years ago during the Great Society reforms, when conservatives appealed to voters’ most sinister hatreds toward the poor and minorities.
And destroyed the Black family, created a permanent interclass of unter-menschen who could be counted on to cast their votes for whoever promised them the most in bread and circuses.
It's absolutely amazing to me that anyone surveying the wreckage of the "Great Society" would have the gall to hold that up as if it is some major triumph. Some triumph!!
Actually, I hope the liberals grab on to this guys advice and run with it. It will make their next series of defeats even more satisfying.
Oh.. and this...
Don’t run away from the liberal title like Kerry did; be unapologetic and flaunt it.
Sounds great to be, Bucky! You just go ahead and do it that way.
Make certain your corporation does not hire this loser. No, he probably has his eye on a government job in the State Dept., God help us. We need to clean out that nest of vipers, and Powell has been an abject failure in that the last four years. He needs to go.
History is on our side.
History is NOT your side. Nazi Germany lost the war. The soviet union collapsed. China is going to a market economy, and only Jimmy Carter's ideal, Cuba, remains to show what pernicious evil system socialism is
2) Fight for every race.
Like the liberals don't cheat lie and steal for every race now?
If the Democrats lose four more Senate seats in the 2006 elections, they’ll lose their ability to filibuster Bush’s judicial nominations, and we can all say good-bye to affirmative action, a woman’s right to choose and the separation between church and state.
Hmm affirmative action ie race discrimination as the law of the land. "a woman's ..." ie murder of the unborn, and separation of church and state. I guess the founders didn't mean it when they came up with "one nation under God"
Liberals win on the issues,
No liberals lose on the issues
but we have serious PR problems.
Yes people have figured out what you liberals really stand for.
We just have to connect the Democratic agenda to notions of morality, family and God, as shameless as that might feel.
In other words lie lie lie and lie some more.
5) Dumb it down and get dirty. That means running negative campaign ads that parallel the type of vicious demagoguery launched against patriots like Max Cleland, Bill Clinton and John Edwards.
Gosh you mean like Dan Blather's forged documents, the phoney missing explosives story and 60 minutes last minute pack of lies?
The Kerry campaign missed its chance to tear at Bush’s character and honor,
Perhaps because Bush has more character and honor than the poodle?
and instead ran Brady Bunch ads that had less resonance in voters’ minds. Run campaigns as much on character as on the issues.
Gun control is only popular in big cities like NYC and Boston where the collective IQ is 10 points lower than in your average Alabama trailer park. But that's OK. You have the "Old Grey Whore" to propagandize for you. Really surprises you liberals when everyone doesn't think the way you do doesn't it?
6) Play offense. The Republicans took our legitimate disdain for Bush and convinced the American public that we were all just hateful people.
Liberals are hateful people. I don't like Bush either, but liberals rabidly hate the man. I dislike his lack of support on the 2nd amendment and his drunken sailor spending, but they personally hate the man.
As a result, Kerry never made direct criticisms of the incumbent president during his nomination acceptance speech, and he never nipped the “flip-flopper” charges at the bud.
More proof that the bedwetter who wrote this had his head in his a$$ the whole campaign
Democrats need to stand up early and passionately, as well as stake out issues before the Republicans beat them to it.
YES!! Keep promising to increase our taxes, take away our guns and give us more federal regulations. We in the American states HATE freedom as much as you liberals do, that's why we voted for Kerry. Oh wait I forgot. We voted for Bush.
Be proud of being a liberal. I’ll never forget listening to an audience member at a Democratic National Convention event choking back tears and asking former Gore campaign manager Donna Brazile, “When did being liberal become so bad?”
It was always bad.
One thing's for sure: Patel let the old lady down.
funny how he can spend so much time studying history and yet know nothing about what actually happened....
as Ms. Coulter would say, let him move out and get a job then he'll wake up!
""Shameless" ?!?"
To me, that summed up the whole thing. This newbie elitist from Odessa has not the first clue about how patronizing, how arrogant, and how bigoted her comment was. And until they get realize that, they will keep getting their rears trounced.
She doesn't seem to realize that countless numbers of red voters have college degrees in more difficult subjects than her's, and could take her apart in any open debate. In fact, her party depends on owning the 'dumbed down' blue collar workers and plantation minorities.
The problem is that he wants to forget he punched the other guy twenty times before the other guy finally got pissed and punched him back.......
BTTT
"We just have to connect the Democratic agenda to notions of morality, family and God, as shameless as that might feel."
It doesn't work if you don't have faith, grasshopper
I think an extended trip to that people's paradise, India, might do this young person a world of good. But maybe not, since he/she already thinks he/she is ready to run the Democratic Party. I am sick to death of being told how to run our country by people who haven't yet learned how to do their own laundry.
As always this guy just does not Get It.
Democrats say they want to move toward Red State voters by spouting their new found moral and religious beliefs. They say that fighting for freedoms like Homosexuality, Abortion and Gay Marriage make them main stream.
In my opinion these people just don't get it. God and Abortion go together like fire and gasoline.
The problem the Democrats have is that Main Stream voters did Get It on election day.
Actually fire and gasoline do go great together, just ask any pyro.....
Here is the absurdity of their position/analysis...
1) Have joy. History is on our side.
- Who started/supported War on Poverty?
- Who started/supported Welfare?
- Who started/supported Affirmitive Action?
- Who started/supported Nuclear Freeze?
- Who opposed the military buildup during the Cold War?
- Who started/escaleted Vietnam War
? - Who 'Lost' Iran?
- Who 'Lost' Cuba?
- Who 'Supported' Nicaraguan Communists?
2) Fight for every race.
- How can you, when you support one race more over another?
3) Define God and “moral values.” We just have to connect the Democratic agenda to notions of morality, family and God, as shameless as that might feel.
- Like "connect" ABORTION to FAMILY and GOD? Good luck!
4) Get over yourself. I’ve been so annoyed by those who say Michael Moore’s a radical...Republicans have something we need: party discipline.
- That's right, keep telling yourself The Fat One is not a radical. Anymore 'discipline' in your party, and you might as well call yourselves the Brown Shirts!
5) Dumb it down and get dirty.
- You really don't get it! HOW DUMMER CAN YOU GET?
7) Be proud of being a liberal.
- and keep saying it (((((LOUDER))))!!!
8) Become more hawkish. Liberals will continue to lose if they look weak on defense....
- Yep. Just put on the 'look' of a Hawk. In fact, just keep telling yourself all you need to do is put on "wolf's clothing", and the American people will get the right message!
'John Doe' and Alyosha Witness appeared in Jackson County Court today on charges stemming from Saturday's flag burning at an anti-war rally in the Ashland Plaza. The two men are each charged with 2 counts of Reckless Endangerment and 1 count of Disorderly Conduct.
If you live in or around San Francisco, it's not hard to "mold" your view of liberals thus.
No more clueless than most of the leftists I am witnessing. Their posts are all reading about the same. They have learned nothing because they aren't capable of admitting that they HAVE anything to learn. After all, they did everything perfectly, right? Why change perfection? (ggg!)
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